Innovative techniques and applications of precision minimally invasive theranostics

Prof. Hongen Liao focuses on the interdisciplinary field of real three-dimensional (3D) image processing and medical visualization with domestic and international research career of more than twenty years, pioneered a frontier research area of intuitive spatial 3D image-guide precision minimally invasive diagnosis and therapy. He has obtained scientifically significant and applied results in the field of scientific exploration, key technologies and "academia-research-industry" transformation in the field of minimally invasive treatment and 3D stereoscopic display, and integrated diagnostic and therapeutic techniques for intelligent medicine. The research integrates the interdisciplinary fields of informatics, optics and medicine, and provides original ideas on how to improve the cognitive ability, judgment and execution of doctors in complex and precision operations by optimizing the effectiveness of 3D vision, and achieves breakthroughs in many fundamental principles and major scientific problems, and actively explores future real 3D imaging and display technologies, which is at the forefront of scientific research in this field.

1. Real 3D medical imaging and the new theory of long-distance 3D display

Prof. Liao's team is one of the first teams in the world to realize naked-eye 3D display with full true color, no visual fatigue, and real-time interaction. Dr. Liao focused on the field of autostereoscopic 3D imaging and medical autostereoscopic display for more than twenty years, pioneered a frontier research area of intuitive spatial 3D image-guide precision minimally invasive diagnosis and therapy. He has developed the first super-long viewing distance display system with an image depth of more than six meters visible to the naked eye, achieving the longest stereo display in the world. He has been awardedmorethan15 invention patents in the United States, Europe, Japan and China in this field.

2. Minimally invasive surgical navigation using 3Dimageoverlay

Prof. Liao has achieved a high-precision, dynamic, interactive, precise and intuitive minimally invasive surgical 3D image overlay navigation that can obtain the spatial structure of the surgical targets from outside of the body, breaking the bottleneck of "eye-hand coordination" that suffered by doctors and providing a new "eye" for the observer. The research has been awarded several international and domestic awards. In March 2020, he was invited by the People's Daily to publish his latest research achievements.

3. Development and application of the integrated diagnostic and therapeutic system for intelligent medicine

Professor Liao has carried out the transformation of intelligent precision diagnosis and therapy from concept-research-clinical application. The original spatial three-dimensional fusion navigation device and integrated intelligent diagnostic and therapeutic system have been evaluated in clinical trials in many fields in domestic and foreign medical institutions such as Beijing Tiantan Hospital, Beijing Tsinghua Changgung Hospital, The University of Tokyo Hospital, etc. It has shown advantages over existing commercial systems in the diagnosis and treatment of neurosurgery, orthopedics, and complex hepatobiliary lesions, and has contributed to the promotion of the development of domestic high-end medical equipment. The series of achievements above have been widely reported by international media such as USA, UK, Germany, Russia and Japan, and exhibited in several famous exhibitions and museums such as Hannover World Fair in Germany, Science Future Museum in Japan and China Science and Technology Museum, etc.

1. C. Zhang, Y. Li, J. Song, Y. Zhai, Y. Zheng, Y. Fan, C. Xiang, F. Chen, H. Liao*: Language and Attenuation-driven Network for Robot-assisted Cholangiocarcinoma Diagnosis from Optical Coherence Tomography, IEEE Transactions on Medical Imaging, 2025. (DOI: 10.1109/TMI.2025.3578179)

2. L. Zhang, G. Ning, H. Liang, B. Han and H. Liao*: One-shot neuroanatomy segmentation through online data augmentation and confidence aware pseudo label. Medical Image Analysis, Vol.95, 103182, 2024.

3. X. Lu, Z. Cui, Y. Sun, H. Khor, A. Sun, L. Ma, F. Chen, S. Gao, Y. Tian, F. Zhou, Y. Lv* and H. Liao*: Better Rough than Scarce: Proximal Femur Fracture Segmentation with Rough Annotations, IEEE Transactions on Medical Imaging, Vol. 43, No.9, pp.3240-3252, 2024.

4. J. Wang, C. Hu, G. Ning, L. Ma, X. Zhang, and H. Liao*: A Novel Miniature Spring-Based Continuum Manipulator for Minimally Invasive Surgery: Design and Evaluation, IEEE/ASME Transactions on Mechatronics, Vol.28, No. 5, pp. 2716-2727, 2023.

5. J. Zhang#, D. Sun#, Z. Luo, A. Yao, H. Chen, L. Zhou, T. Shen, Y. Chen, L. Quan, and H. Liao*: Learning Two-View Correspondences and Geometry Using Order-Aware Network, IEEE Transactions on Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence, Vol.44, No.6, pp. 3110-3122, 2022.

6. G. Ning, X. Zhang, Q. Zhang, Z. Wang and H. Liao*: Real-time and multimodality image-guided intelligent HIFU therapy for uterine fibroid, Theranostics, Vol. 10, No. 10, pp. 4676-4693, 2020. (FrontCover Article)

7. C. Ma, G. Chen, X. Zhang, G. Ning, H. Liao*: Moving-Tolerant Augmented Reality Surgical Navigation System Using Autostereoscopic Three-Dimensional Image Overlay, IEEE Journal of Biomedical and Health Informatics, Vol. 23, No. 6, pp. 2483-2493, 2019. (Cover Article)

8. B. Zhang, F. Ying, P. Yang, T. Cao, and H. Liao*: Worm-like Soft Robot for Complicated Tubular Environments, Soft Robotics, Vol. 6, No. 3, pp. 399-413, 2019.

9. Y. Fan#, Y. Sun#, W. Chang, X. Zhang, J. Tang, L. Zhang*, H. Liao*: Bioluminescence imaging and two-photon microscopy guided laser ablation of GBM decreases tumor burden, Theranostics, Vol. 8, No. 15, pp.4072-4085, 2018. (FrontCover Article)

10. G. Chen, C. Ma, M. Liu, Z. Fan, X. Cui, H. Liao*: Real Time Lens based Rendering Algorithm for Super-multiview Integral Videography without Pixel Resampling, IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics, Vol.24, No.9, pp.2600-2609, 2018.

11. F. Chen, J. Liu, and H. Liao*: 3D Catheter Shape Determination for Endovascular Navigation using a Two-step Particle Filter and Ultrasound Scanning, IEEE Transactions on Medical Imaging, Vol. 36, No.3, pp.685-695, 2017.

12. X. Zhang, G. Chen, and H. Liao*: High Quality See-Through Surgical Guidance System Using Enhanced 3D Autostereoscopic Augmented Reality, IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering, Vol. 64, No. 8, pp.1815-1825, Aug. 2017.

13. H. Liao*: Super long viewing distance light homogeneous emitting three-dimensional display, Scientific Reports, 5: 9532, 2015.

14. J. Wang, H. Suenaga, K. Hoshi, L. Yang, E. Kobayashi, I. Sakuma, and H. Liao*: Augmented Reality Navigation with Automatic Marker-Free Image Registration Using 3-D Image Overlay for Dental Surgery, IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering, Vol.61, No.4, pp.1295-1303, 2014.

15. K. Nakagawa, A. Iwasaki, Y. Oishi, R. Horisaki, A. Tsukamoto, A. Nakamura, K. Hirosawa, H. Liao, T. Ushida, K. Goda*, F. Kannari, and I. Sakuma*: Sequentially timed all-optical mapping photography (STAMP), Nature Photonics, Vol.8, No.9, pp.695–700, 2014.

16. H. Liao*: Integrated diagnostic and therapeutic techniques: Toward an intelligent medical system, Computerized Medical Imaging and Graphics, Vol. 38, No.5, pp.421-422, 2014.

17. H. Liao*, M. Noguchi, T. Maruyama, Y. Muragaki, E. Kobayashi, H. Iseki, I. Sakuma: An Integrated Diagnosis and Therapeutic System using Intraoperative 5-Aminolevulinic-Acid-Induced Fluorescence Guided Robotic Laser Ablation for Precision Neurosurgery, Medical Image Analysis, Vol.16, No. 3, pp.754-766, 2012.

18. H. Liao*, T. Inomata, I. Sakuma, and T. Dohi: Three-dimensional Augmented Reality for MRI-guided Surgery using Integral Videography Autostereoscopic-image Overlay, IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering, Vol.57, No.6, pp.1476-1486, 2010. (Cover Article)

19. H. Liao*, M. Iwahara, Y. Katayama, N. Hata, T. Dohi: Three-dimensional display with a long viewing distance by use of Integral Photography, Optics Letter, Vol. 30 No. 6, pp. 613-615, March 2005.

20. H. Liao*, M. Iwahara, N. Hata, T. Dohi: High-quality integral videography using a multiprojector, Optics Express, Vol. 12 No. 6, pp. 1067-1076, 2004.

(Please visit more scientific research results and other scientific research achievements:http://at3d.med.tsinghua.edu.cn/publications/index.html)

Honors and Awards

Dr. Liao was distinguished by receiving the Government Award [The Commendation for Science and Technology by the Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), Japan] (2006). He was also the recipient of more than ten awards, including the ERICSSON Young Scientist Award (2006), the IFMBE Young Investigators Awards presented by the World Congress on Medical Physics and Biomedical Engineering (2006) and the 6th Asian-Pacific Conference on Medical and Biological Engineering (2005), the FUNAI Information Science Award (2005), and various Best Paper Awards (CARS 2013, JSCAS 2012, ACCAS 2010, JSCAS 2009) from different academic societies. He won the "Huang Jiasi Biomedical Engineering Award", which is the highest science and technology award in the field of Biomedical Engineering in 2017. In 2018, he won the First Prize of “Overseas Chinese Contribution Award” and received the “National Advanced Individuals of Returned Overseas Chinese” issued by the Overseas Chinese Affairs Office of The State Council. In 2019, he was appointed as a Chief Science Communication Expert by the Chinese Association for Science and Technology. In 2021, he received the “SID Beijing Chapter Outstanding Contribution Award”.

Courses

Digital Medicine and Minimally Invasive Surgery

Frontiers of Biomedical Engineering Seminar

Social Service

He is a Chief Science Communication Expert by the Chinese Association for Science and Technology, executive director of the Chinese Society of Biomedical Engineering, and member of the professional group of the Technical Committee of Medical Device Classification of the State Food and Drug Administration. He is also an Associate Editor of International Conference of IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society (Since 2008), the Organization Chair of Medical Imaging and Augmented Reality Conference (MIAR) 2008, the Program Chair of the Asian Conference on Computer-Aided Surgery (ACCAS) 2008 and 2009, the Tutorial co-chair of the Medical Image Computing and Computer Assisted Intervention Conference (MICCAI) 2009, the Publicity Chair of MICCAI 2010, the General Chair of MIAR 2010 and ACCAS 2012, the Workshop Chair of MICCAI 2013, and the General Co-chair of MIAR 2016, ACCAS 2018. He has served as a President of Asian Society for Computer Aided Surgery and Co-chair of Asian-Pacific Activities Working Group, International Federation for Medical and Biological Engineering (IFMBE).

Patents

Prof. Liao has over 90 patents in the field of minimally invasive surgery, medical devices, and 3D medical imaging.